ASIA
16 March 2025
Technology, globalisation and civilisational decline
We live in the midst of civilisation in flux, writes John West.
Robert Kaplan’s book Waste Land: A World in Permanent Crisis paints a portrait of civilisation in flux. Drawing insights from history, literature and art, he examines the effect of modern technology, globalisation and urbanisation on the decline of great powers and increasing domestic polarisation.
The title of Waste Land is inspired by T S Eliot’s famous poem of 1922, ‘The Waste Land’. According to Kaplan, this captures very well the situation of the world today—the end of the old world and a new world not quite coming into being, and a sense of alienation, disjointedness and fragmentation. Kaplan’s book reads like an essay, despite its length of 224 pages, and is triggered by his feeling that we are always in a crisis of some sort.
The first of the book’s three sections argues that Germany’s Weimar Republic, from 1919 until the ascension of Hitler in 1933, is a metaphor for the world today. Weimar was an attempt at forming a stable democracy that would prevent the rise of an autocrat. But it was a sprawling and badly managed system that was always in crisis.
Today, we are all part of the same world, writes Kaplan, as technology has shrunk geography. But we lack effective global governance. Consequently, the world is more claustrophobic and anxious as crises in one part of the world can ricochet to other parts of the world. It is like living in one big Weimar. (Kaplan insists that Weimar is not necessarily a doom and gloom metaphor. Weimar did not have to end with Hitler; human agency played a key role.)
Kaplan discusses the decline of the United States, but argues China and Russia are declining faster than the US, meaning that the US’s relative position is improving.
China and Russia have changed fundamentally from the conservative leaders of Deng Xiaoping’s China and the Soviet Union of the Cold War, when both enjoyed functioning relationships with the US. Today, China is a closed Leninist authoritarian state, with many of its problems masked, not out in the open as is the case in the US. Putin is without the restraint and guardrails that post-Stalin Soviet leaders had.
Kaplan argues that the US was a great power in the ‘print and typewriter age’ which rewarded moderate, complex thinking. Long articles in the media were fact-checked and professionally edited. In the present digital and video era, moderation and complexity of thought have given way to emotion and extremism. One need only look to Donald Trump (whom Kaplan describes as ‘post-literate’), living as he does in a world of social media, with loose-limbed rhetoric that could spark a major crisis.
Consequently, the US is losing its political centre, as Democrats have moved to the left and Republicans to the populist right. The US is now also polarised between the global elite who have benefited from globalisation and the other half who are stuck in the nation state and resent the elite.
Kaplan argues that Washington is in a decadent condition, controlled by money that has taken over the presidency, and where neither political party is serious about the nation’s government debt. The US does have the capacity for dramatic renewal, as history shows. But for the moment the decline of all great powers means a less stable world.
The final section explores the effect of urbanisation and crowds. Previously, the regimes of Hitler, Stalin or Mao practiced tyranny from above. However, today an internet-driven crowd formation can create tyranny from below, where the court of social media is in charge. There is nothing more tyrannical than an emotional crowd and the associated loss of individualism, something which is now more pronounced since humankind is becoming an urban species living in crowded cities.
Kaplan concludes in the following words: ‘There was much hope in Weimar, but insufficient order. Avoiding Weimar’s fate now constitutes the ultimate labour for the world.’ But Kaplan opened his book with the following warning in the words of British philosopher Robert Scruton ‘… hope, detached from faith and untempered by the evidence of history, is a dangerous asset, and one that threatens not only those that embrace it, but all those within range of their illusions’. In sum, to avoid tragedy, it is important to think tragically, as Kaplan says.
Waste Land is rich and dense with speculative analyses. But it may just be a good tonic for readers seeking to grapple with the geopolitical uncertainty of the world today.
The title of Waste Land is inspired by T S Eliot’s famous poem of 1922, ‘The Waste Land’. According to Kaplan, this captures very well the situation of the world today—the end of the old world and a new world not quite coming into being, and a sense of alienation, disjointedness and fragmentation. Kaplan’s book reads like an essay, despite its length of 224 pages, and is triggered by his feeling that we are always in a crisis of some sort.
The first of the book’s three sections argues that Germany’s Weimar Republic, from 1919 until the ascension of Hitler in 1933, is a metaphor for the world today. Weimar was an attempt at forming a stable democracy that would prevent the rise of an autocrat. But it was a sprawling and badly managed system that was always in crisis.
Today, we are all part of the same world, writes Kaplan, as technology has shrunk geography. But we lack effective global governance. Consequently, the world is more claustrophobic and anxious as crises in one part of the world can ricochet to other parts of the world. It is like living in one big Weimar. (Kaplan insists that Weimar is not necessarily a doom and gloom metaphor. Weimar did not have to end with Hitler; human agency played a key role.)
Kaplan discusses the decline of the United States, but argues China and Russia are declining faster than the US, meaning that the US’s relative position is improving.
China and Russia have changed fundamentally from the conservative leaders of Deng Xiaoping’s China and the Soviet Union of the Cold War, when both enjoyed functioning relationships with the US. Today, China is a closed Leninist authoritarian state, with many of its problems masked, not out in the open as is the case in the US. Putin is without the restraint and guardrails that post-Stalin Soviet leaders had.
Kaplan argues that the US was a great power in the ‘print and typewriter age’ which rewarded moderate, complex thinking. Long articles in the media were fact-checked and professionally edited. In the present digital and video era, moderation and complexity of thought have given way to emotion and extremism. One need only look to Donald Trump (whom Kaplan describes as ‘post-literate’), living as he does in a world of social media, with loose-limbed rhetoric that could spark a major crisis.
Consequently, the US is losing its political centre, as Democrats have moved to the left and Republicans to the populist right. The US is now also polarised between the global elite who have benefited from globalisation and the other half who are stuck in the nation state and resent the elite.
Kaplan argues that Washington is in a decadent condition, controlled by money that has taken over the presidency, and where neither political party is serious about the nation’s government debt. The US does have the capacity for dramatic renewal, as history shows. But for the moment the decline of all great powers means a less stable world.
The final section explores the effect of urbanisation and crowds. Previously, the regimes of Hitler, Stalin or Mao practiced tyranny from above. However, today an internet-driven crowd formation can create tyranny from below, where the court of social media is in charge. There is nothing more tyrannical than an emotional crowd and the associated loss of individualism, something which is now more pronounced since humankind is becoming an urban species living in crowded cities.
Kaplan concludes in the following words: ‘There was much hope in Weimar, but insufficient order. Avoiding Weimar’s fate now constitutes the ultimate labour for the world.’ But Kaplan opened his book with the following warning in the words of British philosopher Robert Scruton ‘… hope, detached from faith and untempered by the evidence of history, is a dangerous asset, and one that threatens not only those that embrace it, but all those within range of their illusions’. In sum, to avoid tragedy, it is important to think tragically, as Kaplan says.
Waste Land is rich and dense with speculative analyses. But it may just be a good tonic for readers seeking to grapple with the geopolitical uncertainty of the world today.